Page:Essays and Addresses.djvu/109

 (Paus. x. 13, 7). The religious reserve with which Pindar alludes to the strife between Heracles and the god (Ol. ix. 35, | ) has led critics to infer that the story was one of the  pertaining to mysteries. His reticence probably reflects the tone of the Delphic priesthood in regard to the closely kindred subject which he must have seen in their temple.

§ 27. A favourite image for the paths of song is drawn by Pindar from broad, stately causeways like that (Pyth. v. 87) which his own feet had perhaps trodden in the African Cyrene. See Nem. vi. 47 : Isthm. iii. 19 : v. 22,, "countless roads of a hundred feet [in width] are cleft for onward course of noble deeds." Such touches are suggestive of the improvement in the laying out of Greek towns which took place in Pindar's later years, when Hippodamus, for instance, the architect of the Peiraeus, is said to have introduced broad, straight streets, intersecting each other at right angles (Arist. Pol. ii. 5). Besides works in stone, Pindar alludes to artistic works in several other materials. We hear of silver cups (, Ol. ix. 90), goblets of gold (, Ol. vii. 1), tripods and caldrons (, Isthm. i. 19): in one case,, "prizes in bronze past counting" (Nem. x. 45). A song is likened to cunning work which blends gold, ivory, and coral